caloso

I kinda got into it when I was living in Almaty in the 90s. The English-language sports channel came out of India, so it seemed like there was always cricket on. It made for good hangover TV, especially with the British and Indian accents of the commentators. Very relaxing, as you say.

I remember thinking that if you gave Tony Gwynn a flat bat and no foul territory, they'd never get him out.

gsteinb

we hemmed and hawed when this was in Nora Scotia. Missed it in Massachusetts. Missed it Georgetown ME. Missed in Boothbay last weekend. Finally laid eyes on it this morning. One very happy family.

TMonk

that's a nice specimen. I cruised within a few feet of a great Blue Heron this morning on the drizzly portion of my ride near the SD river slough. It ain't no eagle, but for some reason I really like herons, egrets and cranes.

gsteinb

bird bird bird, bird is the word

big john

There is a huge bird sanctuary in a reservoir near here. Lots of egrets there.

A guy I worked with bought a house which had a Koi pond complete with Koi. The fish started disappearing and he thought his dog was eating them, so he put up a camera. Turned out to be a giant Blue Heron was stealing his Koi. He showed me a picture of the bird spreading it's wings and it looked to be six feet, maybe bigger.

Doge

How does Google know that I am driving, motorcycling or riding (bicycle)?
Car, cycling, walking are not so hard to figure out.

It is the motorcycling I can't figure out how it knows vs a car.

Flatballer

Different Bluetooth? Or no Bluetooth on the motorcycle? Noise level on the mic? G forces and weird angles?

If it knows before you even set off though I'm guessing Bluetooth.

Doge

I have two phones on the motorcycle. One has a different Google account, and just maps and stuff I listen to, and it is not connected to the bike - just my helmet.

Then I put my normal phone (that I often leave home when cycling) in my pocket. Pocket phone somehow routes through the bike to helmet. I'm not sure if the bike just dispatches, or routes the signal. But - I didn't think the Google apps were tied into the motorcycle apps. Likely they are.

The G forces are not that much different than a car. So I'm thinking the phone know angles. G forces, yes, but taking a corner and leaning 30 degrees is just more downward force to the phone - I think, and no different than what the phone would feel in a car, or a bicycle (the way I ride).

I push it a bit more, but not much. They are not near what I used to drive in a car when I was stupid 30.

Enthalpic

Older paper, but phones do use pitch and roll for travel mode detection.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4883407/

"The collected data consisted of readings by accelerometer (accelerations along z-, y- and z-axes) and orientation sensor (pitch and roll)."

cmh

Congrats on the sea eagle sighting gsteinb. What an awesome bird.

himespau 

Anybody an expert on online communications? I'm the captain of my Zwift racing team (grudgingly, because no one else wanted to do it), and have a team of 8 guys. About 6 are on facebook and the other 2 refuse to use it due to privacy/advertising/whatever. 6 are on Slack (including the 2 not on facebook), but 2 are facebook only and dislike the idea of having additional apps. We use Discord for communications during races, but everyone seems to hate discord's text feature. Trying to organize which 6 are going to race each week, get out race strategies, coordinate last minute subs, etc. is a PITA while trying to remember who is on what server for person to person communications and just about everything else has to be duplicate posted in both places (annoying the 4 guys who are on both). Any other suggestions?

I have a shared google sheet that I use to track everyone's availability, organize links to all the various race previews, track where everyone is in terms of power/rest, track who is close to an upgrade (and whether they've done enough races this season that an upgrade doesn't mean they'll have to finish the season racing up a cat), track weekly rosters/keep track of who has sat out how many races, calculate TTT pull length/power, and post my course cue sheets. I wish I could just trust everyone to keep the availability calendar up to date, and then send out a group email once a week with our plan.

As it is, any strategy discussions, I have to summarize and post to the other service that didn't have them. I mean for sure, next season I have to be more forceful about telling club leadership to look harder for someone else.

Enthalpic

Old school reply-to-all emails!

Flatballer

Emails and Google drive might solve a lot of problems, and personally I'd probably try to use Google stuff plus a discord server if everyone is ok with those two. I don't blame the people not wanting to be on Facebook, I've never used slack, Teams is decent but I think it's corporate only basically.

himespau 

Slack is better than Teams, but not by a ton. I get not wanting to be on Facebook, and I also get not wanting to check a 3rd site each day if you are on facebook. Discord seems to have a lot less functionality for text-based stuff than Slack (or Teams), but, since we use it for race communication, that means everyone has it. Maybe I can push harder for people to use it, but it also suffers the same issue for the facebook users of not wanting to check an extra app/site all the time. It probably is the best way to go though.

cmh

My kids teams (soccer, skiing, robotics) all force us onto different apps instead of using an email list and they seem to change apps every year - Instateam, shutterfly, blue sombrero are a few. As an older guy it annoys me to no end, but if I want to know what is going on I have no choice. My cycling team just uses a google group and basically just uses the group email to coordinate. Himespau it sure sounds like you are going above and beyond as team captain and if you want people all on the same app they should fall in line.

hubcyclist

I made a webapp to coordinate group rides for clubs, so you can view a club calendar and rsvp and you can see who is attending, I also a route map and elevation profile and even a weather forecast if it's a few days prior. would love to market this to clubs, honestly, seems like everyone talks about what a mess it is to coordinate stuff. I've even got some background support for charging people membership dues, for clubs that want to bypass bikereg. The hard part is figuring out a fair licensing fee (annually I think) and getting the word out. I'm happy to share with anyone if you think you might want to try with your own groups

speaking of web apps, just for fun I made a workout creator with javascript, it allows you to build a workout (and see a workout graph as you build it) and then export to either MRC or ERG format, folks can give it a go, no registration required! WattComp

burnthesheep

That's cool!

Our team barely uses the Facebook page even. The Google group doesn't update much. It's just "well, when daylight savings hits it's every Thurs night same time same place".

I feel like Zwiftpower has it nailed for the online virtual riding stuff. Set time zone, search by ride type, see who's signed up and the time/place/workout/race. Same thing for local riding worldwide would be amazing.

Psimet2001 

What a time to waltz back over here.

We have a large team. Roughly 200+ in "members" being those that still want to be in the know. About 60 or so still licensing and racing actively. A mix of old grouchy masters and just of drinking age college kids. We sat back a long time ago and really started to question how to communicate. The old people just didn't use Facebook. The kids didn't use Facebook. Some weirdos who work for Google refused to use Facebook. Before that we had a private forum like this one - those days are LONG Gone. We added WhatsApp because at least a large portion of people were using it and it seemed like I could get the old people up to speed fairly quickly. Then everyone starts to talk about switching to slack and teams but no one agrees. We all decide that whatever anyone's hang-ups with WhatsApp were we weren't willing to sacrifice the little progress that had been made.

The best solution is multi-pronged for us and it sounds like most of you are similar

General team Information: Email. It still works and is the only form of communication that absolutely everyone has access to and still has to use daily. Young and old.
Ride information: WhatsApp. Substitute slack or teams or whatever you all swear is the best
Non-essential announcements and information: Facebook and WhatsApp...then copied into a team email when it comes around.
Communication while riding or racing indoors: Discord. I hate it. I don't understand it. I am the old man shaking his fist at the clouds but the "kids" and "gamers" just seem comfortable with it.

Psimet2001 

Oh and for the group rides we run that have others on them that aren't necessarily on the team we have separate channels/discussions for them on WhatsApp. Route maps under the info for the discussion and then we just chime in with changes, information, who is in or out, cancellations, time changes, etc. We have like 4-5 of these just for our team. City rides, Cross practices, Pub route by the shop, fatbiking, gravel, etc. When we have large race series we start a new channel for that event - "where's the tents today? I forgot my shoes does someone have an extra set" kind of stuff. Also channels for women's only, etc.

It's really a complex issue and no one solves all the problems and serves all the needs in an easy to use way that translates well to all of the users and their varying comfort with or general use of technology.

caloso

We also take the multi-approach. Google mail list, FB page, and push texts. We do Discord for Zwift group rides, but nobody ever checks those, so we'll probably give up.

TheKillerPenguin

We use slack exclusively. Works well enough, allows for random general banter too.

himespau 

Honestly, the biggest advantage I see in Slack is that it allows subthreads within a channel so you don't end up with multiple overlapping conversations going on at once like you do with a lot of the different apps/chains/whatever. My favorite part about Facebook messenger is that I can see who has read what. Discord's chat takes away both of those things, but it's the only voice communication app that I know of that works well during Zwifting. As I still refuse to buy a smartphone, I can't say I've ever used WhatsApp, but I know a lot of my students do.

Psimet2001 

We talked about going to Slack and immediately started hearing groans from the older crowd. "I just learned how to use this! do I have to put another thing on my phone?! Honestly i'd just opt out. ...but I want to know about the rides. Can you just text me when they are?"

burnthesheep

Went full wanker and got the 2021 full pro kit of the team our company sponsors (Novo). It was on sale and the colorway was awesome. Also it was our 100 year insulin anniversary year, so it's kinda collectible if you work in the company.

I usually wear it on lunch rides leaving the facility during warm months.

himespau 

Since the one guy on my team who refused to use Slack catted up and can't race with use anymore (at least this Zwift Racing League season), I think I'm going to go back to posting all my strategies and rosters and cue sheets in Slack and just post "team strategy on Slack" on facebook messenger and go back to leaving facebook for social stuff/smack talking.